Rochester-based composer mainTheme has announced the release of his rich new groove track “Take Over Me” (feat. Donno Jay).
Dan Romans plays drum set, synth, keyboard, and voice; composes and arranges music; and performs all styles. He has a diverse musical vocabulary and versatile playing style that is dynamic, expressive, and compositionally focused. mainTheme is a carte blanche repository of sounds and songs drawn from eclectic influences and presented as an approximation of pop music. mainTheme is another variation of Dan Romans’ compositional voice as he dons the figurative producer’s hat.
His latest track “Take Over Me” (feat. Donno Jay) encapsulates mainTheme’s minimal, rich groove and features storytelling and vocal talents of Miami-based hip-hop artist Donno Jay. The track is slated to release on most streaming services by December 27. The track is a powerful, introspective look at the core of one’s life, and the state of the world we all share. With Donno Jay’s cadence and hard-hitting, somber lyrics spit over the desolate electro-synth melodies, this track is strong, catchy, and meaningful.
mainTheme creates music that, to me, breaks down walls. His eclectic, diverse and dynamic range of music paints wondrous soundscapes in each piece of music released. This track, “Take Over Me” is a prime example of this idea. The instrumental to the track is smooth, unique, and presents a vibe that I can best describe as galactic. It is a spacey, synthy, psychedelic piece that contains climbing and falling volumes, with a heightened energy in the middle before slowly dying out like a dimming light. The track is brilliant in both instrumental sound from mainTheme and lyricism from Donno Jay.
For more information on mainTheme’s music and to keep up with “Take Over Me” which releases on December 27, click here.
Khruangbin, Bleachers, and CAKE are slated to headline the second edition of The Capitol Groove, downtown Hartford’s premier festival, returning to Bushnell Park June 28-29.
Presented by GoodWorks Entertainment, the festival will feature 14 artists over two days with performances from Thundercat, Sammy Rae & The Friends, Thee Sacred Souls, St. Paul & The Broken Bones, Fantastic Negrito, Steel Pulse, Ripe, Improvement Movement, Ghost Funk Orchestra, The Greeting Committee, and Spectre Jones. These titillating acts are ones you’ll certainly want to see live.
Beyond the music, The Capitol Groove will also boast a lineup of local craft vendors and food trucks to be announced closer to the festival. Situated in the heart of downtown Hartford, Bushnell Park’s ample green space and natural beauty provides festivalgoers the perfect backdrop for two days of live music, all within easy reach of Hartford’s rich history and vibrant arts scene.
This upcoming festival is the second ever in the fest’s history. The Capitol Groove saw much success last summer and hopes to reach new heights with an even more exciting lineup. Acts like Khruangbin, Thundercat, Bleachers, and CAKE are must sees. These artists are known to bring the absolute groove to new levels wherever they go.
For more information and to purchase tickets to The Capitol Groove festival, click here.
Radio City Music Hall has unveiled their newest addition to the iconic venue, a completely renovated sensory room.
Engaging with the vibrancy and volume of theater may be exciting, but it can also be exceedingly overwhelming- especially for those with particular sensory needs. A passion for attending live performance may be hindered or completely prevented by uncontrollable and overwhelming experiences- which is exactly what Radio City and donors Christopher and Veronica Jackson seek to remediate.
A GRAMMY and Emmy-award winning songwriter, composer, and actor, Christopher and his wife Veronica understand just how overwhelming such experiences can be, as their son CJ is one of many individuals to be diagnosed with autism. Since the diagnosis in 2007, the couple have become staunch supporters of KultureCity, the world’s leading nonprofit on the acceptance and accommodation of invisible disabilities and sensory needs.
“This sensory room reflects our shared dedication to creating an inclusive environment for everyone – ensuring that the magic of Radio City is accessible to all. Our son CJ has been an inspiration to so many and we are honored for him to represent our family at Radio City Music Hall!”
– Chris and Veronica Jackson
Donated and created in honor of CJ, the Radio City Music Hall’s completely renovated sensory room features adjustable lighting, comfortable seating, calming visuals including a piece created inspired by Radio City’s architecture by an artist with autism, and a wide range of sensory tools such as bubble walls, Yogibo bean bags, and a vast range of tactile objects.
Designed to be fully accessible for folks of all abilities and ages including wheelchair users, the Chris and Veronica Jackson Sensory Room joins several other sensory rooms under the MSG Family of Companies in partnership with KultureCity.
Thus far, Radio City, Madison Square Garden, and Sphere feature sensory rooms, have been certified by KultureCity, and feature guest-facing staff that have all completed KultureCity training.
This renovation marks a major step towards a universally enjoyable live performance experience, not just within Radio City’s walls but across the entertainment industry in New York City and beyond.
For more information on Radio City Music Hall’s full range of accessibility resources and services, visit their official website here.
Spoken word artist FlowPoetry and multi-instrumentalist Noah Lehrman have announced the release of their live album slated to release Dec 17.
FlowPoetry (aka Adam Pergament) is a neo/beat spoken word artist who hails from Madison, Wisconsin. Noah Lehrman is a NYC-native world/fusion drummer and multi-instrumentalist. The two artists were recently on tour in the Northeast when an opportunity arose at Rockwood Music Hall in NYC.
Upon finishing their July 31 gig, the duo met up with pianist Shoheen Owhady for their second show of the day, a breakout midnight jazz set as a trio. The three talents felt a connection with Adam’s languid words and Noah and Shoheen’s stunning improvisation on “Tonight”, “DripStuck”, and “Get Up Off the Floor”, along with sparkling reimaginations of FlowPoetry classics “Holy Man”, “Garden”, and “Braincells”, topped by a literally show stopping version of “Rachet”- for an audience crawling with electricity.
Flames & Flowers & Steam is the resultant live album of that late set at Rockwood. The album’s first two singles “Tonight”, an opening incantation that distills the evening’s magic down to its lyrical and experimental essence, and “Drip Stuck”, a romantic meditation on love and loss, are no available on Apple Music, Amazon Music, iTunes, Pandora, Spotify, and all streaming services and digital platforms.
FlowPoetry and Noah Lehrman’s Flames & Flowers & Steam boasts 11 tracks. Each track more unique and exciting than the last. With sensational wordplay, fantastic musical dynamics, and overall, an intoxicating bunch of melodies, this live album is sure to impress the listener as it did the audience in attendance.
That show marked the end of a Midwest-East Coast tour that spanned 3,000 miles, 11 cities, 8 states, 6 guests and 2 time zones, and saw the debut of music and improvisations touching on styles spanning jazz to jambands and edm to cosmic cowboy tunes.
FlowPoetry/Adam is the originator of the lyrical jam poetry form, with over 1800 live US performances under his belt. As a drummer/percussionist, Noah has performed with members of moe., Phil & Friends, RatDog, and more, and he appears internationally as a singer-songwriter. Together they bring a lyrical sense and melodic beats to their song-structures, improvisational explorations, and psychedelic imagery.
For more information on FlowPoetry and Noah Lehrman’s upcoming live album Flames & Flowers & Steam, click here.
Organized by the artist-led organization Fight for the Future, over 600 artists have signed a letter demanding major labels to drop a lawsuit that threatens the existence of the Internet Archive.
Considered the Library of Alexandria of the digital age, the Internet Archive non-profit is one of the only dedicated spaces for digital preservation with the renown, care, and attention it has retained. With a large majority of its material being out of print or obsolete in the modern day, the Archive is a precious resource for artists, fans, and historians alike.
Are you a fan of a band that existed prior to the ritual of posting on social media after a concert? Check the Internet Archive, as they may be featured among the website’s hundreds of thousands of concert recordings. Curious about obscure VHS tapes or radio shows of the past? The Archive has you covered.
Looking for a track only available on the 78 rpm records that predated the vinyl record in the 1890s? The Internet Archive’s community-driven Great 78 Project that seeks to digitize the rare materials is a treasure trove for the niche fanatic or merely curious individual.
If this sounds like an awe-inspiring, nearly endless resource built upon the passion of preservation, that’s because the Internet Archive is exactly that- however, to major record labels, such a space seemed to pose a major threat.
Filed in August of 2023, Universal Music Group and Sony Music filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against the Great 78 project, describing it as an “illegal record store” that performed “wholesale theft of generations of music” under the guise of preservation and research- which the labels claim is all but a “smokescreen.”
This lawsuit would cost the Internet Archive a total of $621 million in so-called damages for the supposed loss of streams grossed as a result of such a project. However, as critics of the labels have pointed out, these 78 records would only cost a total of $41,000 in their entirety based upon their streams thus far.
Such a lawsuit could spell the end for the Archive in its entirety, not just the Great 78 project- including its universally applicable WayBack Machine.
Defendant and expert audio preservationist George Blood who was recruited for the Great 78 Project argues exactly what countless fans and archivists have stated prior- a vast majority of the material being converted would have become media lost to time if not for the care and attention given by the folks behind Internet Archive, who in turn are maintaining not only the sounds of the past but the past itself.
The response from the music community has been a resounding echo of this sentiment, as in the efforts of the artist-led Fight For The Future which has been fighting legal battles for the online musician and user since 2011. In an open letter to Sony, Universal, and other major music labels, Fight For The Future and over 600 artists at the time of writing have demanded the lawsuit be dropped.
Above all, the letter states that musicians “don’t believe that the Internet Archive should be destroyed in [their] name.” The three main demands made are for the labels to 1. Protect our diverse music legacy, 2. Invest in living, working musicians- not back catalogs or monopolies, and 3. to make streaming services pay fair compensation.
Fight For the Future and all of the artists featured share one main argument- in a time where musicians are struggling to get by, why on earth should labels sink so much time, effort, and money destroying a public good?
“The music industry is not struggling anymore. Only musicians are. We demand a course-correction now, focused on the legacies and futures of working musicians.”
Thus far, notable names featured in the letter’s signatures include the lead singer of Riot Grrrl group Bikini Kill Kathleen Hanna, founder of Death By Audio and member of A Place To Bury Strangers Oliver Ackermann, Billie Marten, AJJ, and an ever-expanding countless more.
Want to take action yourself and make your voice heard on the matter? If you’re an artist, you have until Wednesday, December 18 at 12:00 PM EST to add your name to the list of signatures here.
In addition to signing, some musicians are planning to upload music files or live sets of their own to the Archive in solidarity. If you have a recording you’d like to contribute to the cause while simultaneously expanding a public resource for good, visit the Internet Archive’s uploading guidelines.
Are you a music fan or simply a user of the Internet Archive that wants to make a difference? You can sign in solidarity with musicians, archivists, and the average online consumer alike here.
To keep up to date on Fight For the Future’s fight against this major lawsuit and all of their other initiatives, as well as to preserve the Internet Archive for generations to come, be sure to visit their official website.
Long Island native Roger Street Friedman has released his newest americana single, “Banks of the Brazos.” The track is a powerful ode to the “Sugarland 95,” a group of Black convict laborers sentenced to brutal work in Texas sugarcane fields in the post-reconstruction era.
“Banks of the Brazos” is the third single from his upcoming album Long Shadows, due out January 24, the song is a powerful and evocative story that looks into the hidden history of the “Sugarland 95,” a group of African American men who were often victims of unjust laws designed to control the lives of newly freed people.
When the bodies of the Sugarland 95 were unearthed along the banks of the Brazos River, Roger Street Freidman was inspired to write a song from the perspective of one of these laborers. The song aligns with a viral TikTok that Roger posted last year, garnering nearly a million views, resonating with audiences for his honest storytelling.
The song holds a strong outlaw americana feel. The western country flare paired with the dark nature of the song’s backstory sets the listener up to feel it in their heart. Each strum of the guitar shows Roger Street Friedman’s passion and grit for music and exposing history’s many injustices. The track is dynamic, with many changing musical tides throughout the track, but with a meaningfully brawn backbone allowing for wide arrays of sound.
Even the opening sounds from the electric and acoustic guitars simultaneously made me feel something. Followed by the consistent, strong kick and snare, this track immerses the listener from the very start. Both Friedman’s hearty solo vocals and the powerful harmonizing vocals truly touch the heart and soul of whomever may be listening, especially when you factor in how Roger is soulfully expressing his outlook on the horrible enslavement of the Sugarland 95. The track sees a phenomenal climax with soaring vocals followed by a spirit-touching finish that brilliantly yet softly wraps up the hearty ode.
For more information on Roger Street Friedman and his latest single, “Banks of the Brazos,” click here.
Silver Bay YMCA’s bluegrass festival, Bluegrass in Heaven, is undergoing a rebrand to open the festival up to more people. The festival will now be known as “Silver Bay’s Mountain Music Festival.”
The new name aims to open the festival up to more people who enjoy the genres that fall into the mountain music category such as americana and folk. In addition to the new name, the festival is also sporting a new logo to help the rebrand along. The logo features a sun with some music notes behind a mountain range with the text Silver Bay’s Mountain Music Festival below it.
Silver Bay’s bluegrass festival originated in 2023, with the planning for it starting in 2022, when a long-time Silver Bay employee and volunteer, Terry Baker, approached Silver Bay with the idea. Silver Bay’s Mountain Music Festival is set to take place September 12 – 14. The lineup for the festival will be announced in the new year.
Silver Bay YMCA, founded in 1902, is in Silver Bay, NY, just minutes south of Hague. Its 700-acre campus along one mile of Lake George shoreline offers a breadth of programs for all ages. Silver Bay YMCA is consistently ranked one of the top ten family reunion sites in the country and is on the National Register of Historic Places with the U.S. Department of the Interior. As a mission-based charity, Silver Bay YMCA offers outreach programs in addition to its core activities as a premier conference and family retreat center.
For more information on Silver Bay YMCA and their upcoming Silver Bay’s Mountain Music Festival, click here.
Park Street Hospitality has unveiled its latest project, Doc’s Bar & Lounge, a newly renovated event space located within The Park Theater in Glens Falls.
Formerly known as Doc’s Restaurant, this reimagined space on the lower level of the theater now offers a chic and versatile setting for intimate gatherings, corporate events, and special occasions. The floor plan has been reconfigured, removing the booths of the former restaurant to serve as a more functional multi-purpose event space, perfect for cocktail hours, family style dinners and more.
Combining stylish ambiance with enhanced functionality, Doc’s Bar & Lounge provides an elevated experience, perfect for catering to the diverse needs of its guests. This exciting expansion highlights Park Street Hospitality’s dedication to delivering unforgettable moments for the Glens Falls community and beyond.
Built in 1911, The Park Theater is the premier entertainment venue located in the heart of downtown Glens Falls, NY. This century-old theater holds a vast and rich history within the community and has been revitalized as a destination for performing arts, weddings, events and more. In 2021, The Park Theater Foundation was established, launching its inaugural outdoor Summer Concert Series and highly anticipated 2021/22 season.
The Park Theater remains a state-of-the-art performing arts center, featuring national and international touring performers, as well as local community artists and productions. With the renovation of Doc’s Bar & Lounge, the venue just got another exciting and stylish addition to its fan-favorite atmosphere.
For more information on The Park Theater and to stay up to date on future events, click here.
The Wild Center in Tupper Lake has announced the fifth season of Wild Lights which runs from November 29 to February 22, 2025.
The evening experience transforms The Wild Center’s 115-acre campus into a winter wonderland, with thousands of bulbs and a variety of activities and displays. This family-friendly winter event offers a chance to experience The Wild Center in a new light.
Visitors can look forward to a New Immersive Projection Experience. Visitors can explore Wild Lights like never before with indoor and outdoor immersive projection art installations by Echo, an Adirondack artist and co-founder of The Station in Onchiota. Snack at the Mobile Sugar Shack: the shack will be converted into a food truck, serving hot and cold treats at The Wild Center’s patio space.
Wild Lights Light Lager: Raquette River Brewing’s festive creation will be returning and can be purchased at The Wild Center, as well as in-store and on tap at Raquette River Brewing Co. and other local stores. Forest Music: the looped trail with over 130 trees wrapped in colorful lights synchronized to a 10-track musical compilation from Whatever Penny entitled Songs for an Old Pine Forest. Lit Photo Ops: oversized neon bird wings that provide a perfect photo op and other new illuminated sculptures guide visitors through the different paths and trails. The Wild Supply Co. will be available for shopping, and indoor experiences will be open, including Planet Adirondack and the Living River Trail, where guests can watch North American River Otters play.
Located in Tupper Lake, NY, The Wild Center uses science-based experiences, exhibits and programs to open new ways to look into the relationship that people have with nature and to promote environmental best practices. A 54,000-square-foot facility, The Wild Center features outdoor space, live animals, and its popular Wild Walk, an elevated trail across the Adirondack treetops. Tupper Lake is a great little town for music heads too. The town constantly sees stages full of local artists at venues including The Wild Center.
From Nov. 29 to Feb. 22 the Wild Lights show is held on Friday and Saturday evenings. The event is open nightly during Holiday Week on Dec. 26 to 31 and Winter Week on Feb. 14 to 22. Admission to Wild Lights is to be purchased separately from day-time admission to The Wild Center. From Nov. 29 to Feb. 22, member pricing is $7 for adults and $2 for children ages 5-17, and non-member pricing is $12 for adults, and $7 for youth. Admission is free for children 4 and under.
For more information on Wild Lights and to purchase tickets, click here.
Fast Tony Productions has announced the Sunday Blues Festival at The Parting Glass in Saratoga Springs for February 2, 2025.
Featured Guitarist – Toronzo Cannon
Headlining the festival is world-renowned blues guitarist and vocalist Toronzo Cannon. This isn’t just another night of great live music—it’s a celebration of the blues in a venue that captures the magic of intimate live performances.
If you’re a fan of blues, live music, or just good times, this is shaping up to be a night you won’t want to miss. Cannon has become a force to be reckoned with in the world of electric blues. His unique blend of modern Chicago blues, soulful vocals, and electrifying guitar work has earned him rave reviews from all over. Whether he’s ripping through an emotionally-charged guitar solo or delivering a poignant social commentary through his lyrics, Cannon’s performances leave audiences spellbound.
Fast Tony Productions may be new to Saratoga, but Anthony Mangano-Delaney has already shown his ability to pull off big events. His first show in November 2024, featuring Bywater Call, was a resounding success, drawing a crowd of 150 and setting the stage for continued exciting performances to come. Tony is also eager to see how Fast Tony Productions can carve out its space within the vibrant Saratoga music scene with venues like Caffe Lena, Putnam Place, and SPAC.
Known for its cozy atmosphere, The Parting Glass is the perfect backdrop for one of Chicago’s brightest blues stars. The festival kicks off at 5:00 PM with non-stop music leading into Toronzo Cannon’s headlining set at 7:30 PM.
For ticket information on the February 2, 2025, Sunday Blues Festival at The Parting Glass in Saratoga Springs, click here.
